Through the course of almost half a century, J.S. Bach wrote sacred music for virtually every kind of occasion his faith called for. And among the hundreds of cantatas, the Passions, the masses, and the oratorios, Magnificat was Bach’s most elaborate sacred work to date. The Magnificat is the first large choral work that Bach composed after his appointment in Leipzig in the spring of 1723. The text comes from the “Song of Mary,” a rich statement of purpose and faith from the Gospel of Luke, and is about the visit made by Mary to her cousin Elisabeth, who was also pregnant. It was first performed on Christmas Day 1723. Musica Viva NY performs Bach’s revised version from 1733 featuring transverse flutes and two oboes.

About Reena Esmail (composer + vocalist)        
Indian-American composer Reena Esmail works between the worlds of Indian and Western classical music, and brings communities together through the creation of equitable musical spaces.  Esmail’s life and music was profiled on Season 3 of PBS Great Performances series “Now Hear This”, as well as “Frame of Mind”, a podcast from the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Esmail divides her attention evenly between orchestral, chamber and choral work. She has written commissions for ensembles including the Los Angeles Master Chorale, Seattle Symphony, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra and Kronos Quartet, and her music has been featured on multiple Grammy-nominated albums, including The Singing      Guitar by Conspirare, BRUITS by Imani Winds, and Healing Modes by Brooklyn Rider. Many of her choral works are published by Oxford University Press.

Esmail is the Los Angeles Master Chorale’s 2020-2025 Swan Family Artist in Residence, and was Seattle Symphony’s 2020-21 Composer-in-Residence. She has been in residence with Tanglewood Music Center (co-Curator – 2023) and Spoleto Festival (Chamber Music Composer-in-Residence – 2024). She also holds awards/fellowships from United States Artists, the S&R Foundation,the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and the Kennedy Center.

Esmail holds degrees in composition from The Juilliard School (BM’05) and the Yale School of Music (MM’11, MMA’14, DMA’18). Her primary teachers have included Susan Botti, Aaron Jay Kernis, Christopher Theofanidis, Christopher Rouse and Samuel Adler. She received a Fulbright-Nehru grant to study Hindustani music in India. Her Hindustani music teachers include Srimati Lakshmi Shankar and Gaurav Mazumdar, and she currently studies and collaborates with Saili Oak. Her doctoral thesis, entitled Finding Common Ground: Uniting Practices in Hindustani and Western Art Musicians explores the methods and challenges of the collaborative process between Hindustani musicians and Western composers. 

Esmail was Composer-in-Residence for Street Symphony (2016-18) and is currently an Artistic Director of Shastra, a non-profit organization that promotes cross-cultural music connecting music traditions of India and the West. She currently resides in her hometown of Los Angeles, California. ReenaEsmail.com

About Musica Viva NY
Musica Viva NY is a non-profit arts organization that was established nearly 50 years ago. Its mission is to bring world-class music to a wide community through an annual concert series, an active community engagement program, and an ambitious artistic vision. Under the baton of Artistic Director Alejandro Hernandez-Valdez since 2015, Musica Viva NY strives to offer joy, solace and renewal in a complex world by presenting new compositions and classic masterworks in transformative interpretations that ennoble the human spirit.
 
Musica Viva NY’s superb chamber choir and world class collaborating instrumentalists make their concert home at Manhattan’s historic All Souls NYC. They regularly combine their  presentation of the classical repertoire with less widely known works, as part of their commitment to perform the works of living American composers, women composers and composers of color, including works that address social, racial or environmental issues. Composers whose works have been featured in recent Musica Viva NY performances include Florence Price, Alexandra T Bryant, Steve Reich, Frank Ticheli, Missy Mazzoli, Alice Walker, Joel Thompson and Jesse Montgomery.
 
Musica Viva NY has commissioned and premiered numerous works by contemporary composers including Bora Yoon, Seymour Bernstein, Elena Ruehr, Joseph Turrin, Bruce Saylor, Jean-Louis Petit, Eugenio Toussaint, Gilda Lyons, Richard Einhorn, Trent Johnson and Trevor Weston.
 
Beyond high-quality concert performances, Musica Viva NY also serves the communities of New York City through a growing variety of rich community engagement programs. Currently, Musica Viva NY partners with New York city public schools, extracurricular youth ensembles, New York Public Library branches and the All Souls’ Monday Night Hospitality dinner program, offering free performances, artist clinics, interactive workshops, and more. Musica Viva NY has nurtured young artists throughout its half century of existence. Great musicians who have been Musica Viva NY singers and soloists include the Metropolitan Opera stars Samuel Ramey and Renée Fleming, and Broadway’s Aladdin, Michael Maliakel.
 
The organization was founded as an annual concert series in 1977 by Walter Klauss, who directed the group for 38 years, and adopted the name “Musica Viva” in 1985. Under Walter Klauss’ baton the choir toured in Paris (2004), Germany and Czechoslovakia (2006) and Italy (2012). 
 
Ticketing + Program Information:
Sunday, December 8, 2024, at 5:00 p.m. (pre-concert talk at 4:00 p.m.)
All Souls NYC, 1157 Lexington Avenue, New York City, Subways: 6 to 77th St or 4/5/6 to 86th St
Tickets: $50 ($30 for students) are available from MusicaViva.org. 
 
Performers: 
Musica Viva NY choir
Alejandro Hernandez-Valdez, artistic director and conductor
TBA, guest vocalists
TBA, sitar and tabla
Baroque orchestra 

Program: 
This Love Between Us: Prayers for Unity (2016) by Reena Esmail 
Magnificat BWV 243 (1723) by J.S. Bach